


The Grey and Tender Rain

by lunabee34 (Lorraine)



Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: Episode Tag, Episode: s07e11-12 Evolution, M/M, Temporary Amnesia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-27
Updated: 2017-08-27
Packaged: 2018-12-20 08:16:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,117
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11916849
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lorraine/pseuds/lunabee34
Summary: Jack and Daniel wait for air rescue after the events of "Evolution" part 2.  While they're waiting, Daniel recovers another missing piece of his past.





	The Grey and Tender Rain

**Author's Note:**

  * For [jdjunkie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jdjunkie/gifts).



> Requirement (#1): Jack and Daniel are stranded, on-world, off-world, wherever.  
> Requirement (#2): Anytime post Daniel's return in season 7.  
> Optional Request: Kissing in the rain. What? I'm a romantic. Sue me.  
> Restriction (#1): No UST with anyone else, but I'm fine with mention of wives.  
> Restriction (#2): No permanent character death
> 
> Title taken from Lizette Woodworth Reese's poem "Oh, Gray and Tender Is the Rain."

Jack is standing ankle deep in mud, rain sluicing down the thick tangle of foliage overhead and drenching him.  His hair is dark with water, his eyes hidden behind the sunglasses he doesn’t need in this deluge, and Daniel can’t stop looking at him.  He can almost remember standing next to Jack during another storm and watching drops of water clinging to Jack’s jawline for long moments before falling to pool in his collarbone.  Daniel remembers the strange quality of light in that storm, the way everything else seemed flat and grey and all the color in the world was centered on Jack.  That moment was important, but Daniel doesn’t know why.  He can’t even remember where they were or what happened in the moments before or after that brief slice of time; all he can see is the endless press of rain and Jack standing close enough to touch.  If he didn’t hurt so badly, Daniel would be annoyed.  Apparently he doesn’t remember everything about his life before he ascended after all.

 

Daniel shifts his position slightly to lean back more fully against the wall, and pain flares in his thigh.  He winces, and Jack comes back inside the shack, tracking a muddy trail over to Daniel.

 

“You okay?” he says. 

 

Daniel says, “I’m fine,” which isn’t technically a lie.  The pain is slowly settling down again into a more manageable kind of agony.  “Air rescue should have been here by now.”

 

“Yeah.”

 

“At least the rebels have food and water,” Daniel says.  “We can hole up here for awhile if we need to.”

 

Jack looks at the blood-soaked bandana he tied around Daniel’s leg and sighs.  “I better go cut Lee off just in case.  He’s been eating beef jerky like there’s no tomorrow.”

 

Jack walks back into the rain, and suddenly Daniel remembers.  He remembers fishing with Jack at his cabin, and a storm rolling in over the lake.  They were soaked before they even reached the end of the pier.  Jack laughed, his hands full of tackle and bait, and then he dropped it all on the wet planks and kissed Daniel while the thunder pealed.  This wasn’t a first kiss either.  Daniel can tell. 

 

Jack squelches back into the shack.  “Lee is passed out in the mess tent.  Burke decided to track back the way we came, and see what he can find.  We can’t hail air rescue on the radio, so I’m guessing they ran into some kind of trouble.”

 

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Daniel says.

 

“What do you mean?” Jack says.  “I am telling you.”  Then he looks at Daniel’s face, and whatever he sees there makes him fold in on himself and become small in a way that Daniel has never seen before.  “Oh,” he says, “that.”

 

“Yes.  That.”

 

Jack sits on the ground, leans against the wall opposite Daniel, and takes off his shades.  He’s quiet for long enough that Daniel thinks he isn’t going to say anything at all, and then Jack says, “You didn’t remember. You remembered the Ancient word for star system and what kind of tea you like and Carter’s birthday, but not this.  You remembered everything else.  Just not us.”  He thunks his head back against the wall.  “What was I supposed to do?”

 

Daniel takes a couple of deep breaths and tries to think rationally, beyond the anger that Jack has kept something so important from him.  Lashing out at Jack won’t change anything, and he can hear the hurt in Jack’s voice.  Keeping this secret must have been more terrible and lonely than Daniel can imagine.  “You know,” Daniel says, “I still don’t remember. Not really.  Why don’t you tell me?”

 

So Jack does.  He tells Daniel everything, and he’s open and raw and vulnerable, and he says all the words out loud, even the hard ones.  In Daniel’s clearly fragmentary experience, the only emotion Jack expresses with any confidence and regularity is anger, so listening to him tell the story of how they fell in love is even more shocking than the surprise of remembering that long ago kiss in the rain.

 

Daniel says, “Do the others know about us?”

 

“Maybe.  Probably.  We haven’t talked about it.”

 

“That’s the first thing you’ve said in the last ten minutes that actually sounds like something you’d say.”  Daniel’s going for levity but realizes he’s hurt Jack’s feelings the instant the words leave his mouth, and he regrets them immediately.

 

“And that’s why I didn’t tell you.”  Jack smiles like the expression physically hurts him.  “Either you remember, or you don’t.  Either you fall in love with me again, or you don’t.  I’ve run through the possibilities for months now.  Maybe I tell you, and everything turns weird because you don’t feel the same way anymore, or maybe I tell you, and you feel obligated to try because you feel sorry for me, not because you feel the same way.  Or maybe worst of all, I tell you, and you say thank you for telling me, and that’s the end of it.”

 

A bone deep and nearly overwhelming affection wells up in Daniel; its edges are sharp and dangerous.  It’s not comfortable or safe or easy, not at all, but it feels like finally coming home.  “You’re forgetting an option,” Daniel says.  “Maybe you tell me, and I say that the few memories I have of being with you are enough to convince me that what we had is worth trying to reclaim.  Maybe I say that knowing we were together is like finding the piece of the puzzle I didn’t know was missing.”

 

Jack smiles again, and this time the expression makes him look twenty years younger.  “I like that option.  Let’s go with that option.”

 

“I’m still mad,” Daniel says.  “And you’re still hurting, and I don’t remember everything yet, but yeah.  Let’s go with that option.”

 

Jack hooks his ankle around Daniel’s good leg just as the whir of the chopper breaks through the white noise of the rain.  Burke pops his head into the shack, and if he’s heard any of their conversation or thinks there’s anything weird about Jack and Daniel playing footsie, he doesn’t let on.

 

“Our chariot awaits, gentlemen,” Burke says.

 

Jack hauls Daniel to his feet, and Daniel limps over to the waiting chopper with his help.  Bill Lee is already strapped in, a strip of beef jerky dangling from his mouth, and Burke’s not far behind him.  Jack settles Daniel into the chopper, taking the seat next to him, and the whole long flight out of the jungle, Daniel closes his eyes, leans into Jack’s warmth, and gets ready to make new memories.

 

 

 

 


End file.
